


Hold back the river

by Liffis



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Angst, M/M, Massive angst, Past Relationship(s), Post-Divorce, alternative view, fic of a fic, tfw ur divorced but still love ur ex-husband
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:33:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21588433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liffis/pseuds/Liffis
Summary: Sasha's in a Russian club when his phone pings with a message of his ex-husband./Or: a fanfic to McSpot's "A Long, Long Getaway" and the scene where Nicke confronts Sasha, from Sasha's POV.
Relationships: Nicklas Backstrom/Alexander Ovechkin
Comments: 5
Kudos: 158





	Hold back the river

**Author's Note:**

  * For [McSpot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/McSpot/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Restricted Work] by [McSpot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/McSpot/pseuds/McSpot). Log in to view. 



> Y'ALL.  
> Okay, so first and furthermost: this is a fanfic to McSpot's "A Long, Long Getaway". I LOVE THIS FIC. If you haven't read it - love yourself and read it, please.  
> That being said: I've read it quite a lot, and that one scene where Nicke confronts Sasha and, for the first time ever, Sasha goes off-script and reacts differently, that - that is SUCH an intense scene. I mean, the whole fic is intense (and extremely realistical and well-written), but this one hits me so hard. And then I was like "yeah but what about Sasha?" and....well, end of the line is: McSpot allowed me to write fic. So I fic'ed. (Angstily.)  
> The cursive of the text messages is directly taken from McSpot's fic!
> 
> (Fic title is from James Bay's song of the same title, because it's the exact perfect kind of schmoopy and angsty!)

Sasha doesn’t notice his phone’s ping; it’s Evgenij who jams an elbow into his side and hollers at him for not turning his “fucking phone off on their special evening”. Considering they’ve so far already spent four “special evenings” like this one, and considering it only meant partying with their friends in Moscow’s latest clubs and bars….well, Sasha doesn’t take him serious. There are currently more than two dozen people around their table and there are always more flocking to them or going to dance and it’s overall crowdy and noisy, so someone must’ve forgotten their phone.

But then Dmitrij leans closer and tsks at well, shoving a shot glass over.

Sasha grabs his phone, out of reflex, as he absentmindedly empties the glass. Phone tax paid, now for the message.

He almost drops the phone when he sees the name on the display.

_1 new text message. Kolja._

His heart, suddenly, violently, stills and the noise falls away as he stares at the display – until his heart jumpstarts into overdrive. Nicke, Kolja. A message, from him, out of the blue sky, Sasha didn’t write him, he didn’t – had he? But no, he’d kept his phone away during their clubbing nights, as promised. So, a message, from Kolja -

His fingers shake as he opens the message.

_You've been asking Andre and Christian for information on me?_

God, it’s been _months_ now, it shouldn’t hurt as if his ribs are caved out. But it does, all the time – the messages are rare and few in-between that it aches, every time. Tiny morsels he still hoards away, greedily, digging them up again and again and again, when he’s stressed, before big matches, when he stumbles through his days and thinks about how he cannot do this alone, not even a single step more – he picks up the old messages. A reminder. A piece of it, them – Nicke. Something real. A faint echo of what he had, once, a lifetime ago –

He won’t ever forget Nicke’s smile, the way his pale green eyes glittered – Sasha can even picture the way Nicke must’ve furrowed his brows when typing on his phone. Such a short time ago, he would’ve seen it, too, with Nicke at his side, in their home –

But that way, just aching, hollowing regret lies.

Sasha’s fingers shake only slightly when he types out a response. Something peppy, funny, but not too funny.

_Nicke! You texting me now?,_ _is all he manages back._

Keep it easy. Simple. A delicate line to tread: he wants, needs, loves, with a force that hurts even himself but he can’t let it out. He – there’s a paper, saying he can’t, not anymore, not a husband anymore. Not by law.

He wants to write a million things and all of them would be true and god, he wants Nicke to know them, Nicke deserves to know them – but it is months too late. Sasha is too late. And he can’t fuck it up, he can’t, he knows he’s playing with fire as it is, that he’s just one fuck-up away of Nicke disappearing completely – so, this. This is safe. They’ve played this out. Nicke won’t disappear after a message like this, won’t drop him completely.

Nicke’s going to be there. Far away, yes. Mocking him, also yes, and seeing him so far away and tasting on his lips the words he’d never said but should’ve, should’ve told him -

He feels sick with how nervous he is, anxiously waiting for anything back, hoping that it wasn’t the drop that let it all overflow – well, overflow even further. Sasha had collected too many drops in their marriage, filling the barrel way beyond its capacity and expecting Nicke to pick it up. Nicke, who is so utterly important that Sasha hadn’t even considered – and now that it is over and signed, Sasha sitting in Moscow’s clubs and cursing his past self, oh. Oh, how stupid he’s been. How stupid he still is.

_Answer the question._

Fuck, he can even imagine how Nicke would say it, how his voice would curl around it, how he always was so curt and sharp around words and he misses it, he misses it, he’d trade his whole life – what good were the successes, the wins, the medals, the golds, all the money? And fuck his consideration of Russia, of home: what was wearing these jerseys worth, anyways?

Ashes and dust and a closet full of regrets. None of them could bring back the joys of kissing Nicke, of Nicke’s hands carefully holding his, of nights spent in heated discussion. Of Nicke’s smile and laughing; the way living had been – so easy, with him.

Sasha wants to go back in time and shake his past self every single day during their marriage for fucking it up, for letting it slip out of his hands, for treating Nicke this horribly. He hadn’t seen, back then. Had thought that titles were more important.

_(((((( dont be mad at them. Sometimes I ask how you doing._

Typing it out makes himself sound slightly stalker-ish. Like the ex who hadn’t gotten the message. And he hadn’t, even while he hadn’t been the ex – even while he had still been Nicke’s husband, he hadn’t gotten it. Hadn’t seen. Hadn’t seen the man he loves slip through the cracks Sasha carelessly left –

When had he decided that this was okay of him to do? When had he stopped – when had he decided that he could put Nicke away like a treasure, to be admired – and not loved and _growing_ and –

_So I've heard._

For a second, he’s frozen, because what does he say? The truth? Ha. No, he’s throughoughly wasted that chance. There are a lot of words threatening to burst out – but he’s lost the right that Nicke would hear him out.

_Why do you care?_ _, a second message pings._

And, god. God. He wants to tell him. Wants to tell Nicke how sorry he is. How it has taken him Nicke to move out to realize how he has barely a handful of photos of them, together, where they’re visibly a couple. More pictures in which they might as well be acquaintances. But so few to show years – years! – of a marriage, of _love_.

A few hidden-away pictures, yes, of them on dates. None of Nicke in his arms, celebrating with him. Only a few of them on dates. Too few. So much lost because Sasha was scared of unnamed fears.

He’s conquered them, slain the beast, won the Cup –

And what now? It’s collecting dust, in one of the closets, with the matching ring and the lockets. Unimportant.

_I always care, you know that. I told you, I never stop loving you. I never stop wanting to know you okay._

_It doesn’t even come remotely close to what he feels, but if he writes more, he’s going to crack himself open like glass and – he can’t, he’s transparent as it is. And it’s going to scare Nicke away for good, for sure: Nicke hates him typing this out, reminding him of love again and again._

_Sasha doesn’t dare digging deeper, discussing this even further, of tackling this issue and discussing it out: what if, one day, Nicke will leave? What if that’ll be the discussion that will mean Nicke’s going to pack up and go and_ _leave_ _?_

_This messaging dance they’re doing, it is – it hurts, of course, but it is well-known by now and…and as long as it exists, there’s a tiny thread still._

_You don't have the right to ask that of them. You know they aren't going to say no to their captain._

Nicke is right, of course. But Sasha can’t also _not_ ask them and let the last remains of Nicke in his life slip out of his grasp completely. It’s all he has of his husband. It’s selfish. Sasha’s selfish, what else is new regarding Nicke -

_I ask because you dont talk to me!_

Of course they don’t talk, they’re divorced. Nicke divorced him, because Sasha made him unhappy. So they are separate and of course Nicke doesn’t talk. And that’s Sasha’s fault and his mistake. Or, rather: mistakes, years upon years of them.

_That's what being divorced means. It means you don't talk to each other anymore._

Nicke has said this so often, Sasha has heard it more often: not just from Nicke. From his family. His friends. His lawyers. _It is over,_ they tell him, _And HE wanted the divorce, Sasha, there are a million women – men – you can date and yet you run after him like a dog._

It’s stupid, of course. Everyone expects that Sasha should go on and let him go in turn. Just like that, years upon years of love, gone. Let Nicke go – out of what? Because he no longer loves him? Ridiculous.

_I didnt want a divorce! I always want to talk to you! I LOVE you, Nicke, thats why I marry you!_

These words don’t even come close to what he still feels for Nicke. His husband. They’re divorced but Sasha isn’t, can’t, not Nicke, the thought makes him sick of just one day – living without being Nicke’s in a way. The months hadn’t changed this, wouldn’t change it, not ever, Nicke isn’t someone he’s going to get over.

_Love wasn't enough anymore. I loved you and you loved me and I was dying in that marriage. I felt like I lost myself._

God, it shouldn’t hurt, not anymore, he’s heard all of it several times over, from Nicke. It shouldn’t hurt.

But it does. The easy admittance, the words, _I loved you_ , so easily spoken – carelessly, dropped like they’re of no further value. And the tense. _Loved_ , not: love. Past. Over and done with.

It still feels like his heart is being ripped out, so much he feels like he can’t breathe, every time he hears it. Nicke had been in love, had loved him and Sasha had loved him, still loves him, and he’d hurt Nicke so much that Nicke said that their marriage almost killed him. All that Nicke was, almost wiped away by their marriage.

All because of Sasha.

And there’s nothing he can do, nothing he can undo any longer, nothing he can say to make all that happened hurt Nicke less, to say sorry, to heal what he’s done unto him. Nothing. No word matters, nothing he could do or say would undo the years of harm he’s done. He’s hurt Nicke, the one he loves still, he’s hurt him in how sated and lazy and blind, so stupidly, utterly _blind_ he’d been.

If only he could go back in time: he’d shake himself so hard until the brain rattled in his skull to appreciate it, appreciate Nicke, love him and show him so, every day, let him know and treat him so and be better. Start working on deserving him.

But he can’t, and back then, he hadn’t done any of it.

He wants to tell him. Wants Nicke to know. It doesn’t matter that it feels like he’d really crack himself open and how that is something that’s been scaring him since he could think, something everyone has always warned him about: _never do this_ , they’d say, _never make yourself this vulnerable for someone, you will only give them power._

So he’d gone and done just that and – and had still lost. If anything, he’s lost even more. Now he is still so vulnerable - except he has nothing to show for it, nothing but a million memories and regrets and a wedding ring he’s kept despite their divorce.

There’s too much he could say, wants to say, needs Nicke to know, but the truth is –

_Im so sorry Nicke. I didnt treat you right. I didnt see it till it too late. Ill always love you. But I am sorry. You deserve better._

It’s the most he’ll let himself type. It still feels too close, to honest, too much against what he’s been taught since he’d been a teenager. Don’t be vulnerable. So he hadn’t been.

He can’t mend it all, will never be able to, never again – even if he had the right to do so. But he can be honest. It’s too late but he can try. For Nicke’s sake. Nicke deserves it.

Sasha can’t be the husband that deserves Nicke. Not anymore.

He can’t be Nicke’s anymore.

His phone stays silent and maybe that’s better because he shouldn’t cry but he does and in the overall list of things he shouldn’t have done but still does when it comes to Nicke, this is a failure he can forget easily.

**Author's Note:**

> Did I mention I love angst? Because I do.


End file.
